Blackface: Beyond the Pale?

Posted on 11th March 2013 by MRDA

Two weeks back, I noticed something of a stir being whipped up over a French fashion shoot involving teen model Ondria Hardin.

1361984043167-cached35

Predictably, it drew backlash from all the expected circles: some complaining about the missed opportunity to cast a natively melanised model for the shoot; others moaning that the noiring of Hardin constituted yet another example of the racially-riling phenomenon known as ‘blackface’.

On the first issue, I felt a smidgen of sympathy, what with the underemphasis of sub-Saharan models in the public domain. Surely if he wanted to give his audience a taste of Africa, photographer Sebastian Kim could have saved himself a ton of aggro and make-up by going for those whom nature noired earlier.

485831_451345004908217_2011909971_n22

As things transpired, though, I didn’t find much of anything to get worked up about. Though I wonder as to the rationale behind Kim’s casting choice, I also think the end result turned out rather tastefully. With the combo of dark skin and Caucasoid facial structure, the regally Africanized Hardin could just about pass for an Eritrean or Ethiopian bird.

african-queen116

The overblown media reaction brings to mind the noise and fury generated over that Claudia Schiffer shoot from a few years back. Similarly, model and photographer paid a classy homage to sub-Saharan aesthetics, and similarly, they suffered the verbal slings and arrows of the chattering classes.

493df07ac076ed20b21ab4df82913438

Curiously, this umbrage doesn’t extend to the more garish examples of the phenomena that I’ve seen in Western media over the past decade. If anything, blackface here in Britain underwent something of a revered revival via the success of such shows as Little Britain…

little-britain

..and its coattail-riding follow-up, Come Fly With Me.

c315

Not that folk were consistent with their open-arms attitude to blackface. Across the pond, Robert Downey Jr. got himself into a bit of bother with his stint of schwartzing in Tropic Thunder.

alg_robertdowneyjr16

If only he’d been a black gone blanc, such a fuss could’ve been avoided!

marlon-and-shawn-wayans-amazing-makeup-in-white-chicks18

Still, if it’s offensive appropriations they seek, the smelling-salt-sniffing offenditarians might be better off turning their eyes much further Eastward. Over in Korea, they’ll find plenty of examples befitting the “sambo” caricatures of yesteryear.

jkipf18

20120308_seoulbeats_blackface18

m8d9uv16

And let’s not forget Japan, with films like Vampire Girl vs. Frankenstein Girl pushing the trope to the apex of absurdity.

protectedimage-php_24

Kinda makes the matter of a classy French fashion photoshoot, um, pale in comparison, no?

~MRDA~

Posted in Movies, News, Racial Issues, TV | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

The Bulging Blindspot: Consent, Culpability, & Consistency

Posted on 27th February 2013 by MRDA

Last fortnight marked the twenty year anniversary of the murder of James Bulger and, as expected, media outlets opined and emoted on cue about the fatal events that marked the day and “shocked the nation”. Inevitably, the commemorations bled over onto the social networks, where I encountered this meme:

560137_254745584660521_1715553805_n7

I had to laugh. Tacky, out-of-control, mawkish, and probably made by someone with no fucking connection to said child or his family, it symbolized for me the runaway emotionalism and Good Guy Badge-whoring one-upmanship that swept across the nation like a plague in the wake of the murder, infecting the populace with a special strain of stupidity it has yet to recover from to this day.

I remember being in the final year of my halcyon primary school days at the time, registering the news as another tragic turn of events but not much more than that. I also remember sitting cross-legged on the class mat with all the other kids, listening to our teacher sermonizing over and eliciting responses to the event. It all had the feel of a Very Special Episode from some otherwise goofy American sitcom.

Further afield, parents across the land clasped their kids to their chests in trembling, frothing indignation, drowning them in spittle and smother. Projecting their own spawn into the sad scenario, they snarled for explanations and eviscerations for the grisly crime. Enter the gutter press, ever eager to capitalise on calamity, branding the two preteen murder suspects – Robert Thompson and John Venables – as devil children, the spawn of Satan Himself. Beyond snarling for their sentences to be extended and generally stirring up the lynch mob mentality amongst their readership, they leapt on a tenuous connection to engineer a moral panic over the movie Child’s Play III.

nasty21

The main recipients of national outrage, however, remained the pint-sized, primary school pair themselves. To this day, they live with concealed identities, the authorities they received them from knowing full well the socially-endorsed hunting season that would commence upon their unveiling. Venables being re-arrested for archiving kiddy porn in 2010 no doubt met with the relish of a population firmly convinced of the childhood culpability of the two.

However, make the case for preteen…nay…midteen personal agency in an entirely different context and watch the script undergo a sharp one-eighty flip.

Last September, fifteen-year-old schoolgirl Megan Stammers caused something of a commotion when she ran off to France with her maths teacher, Jeremy Forrest. Far from conceding her part in events, most members of the public who vocalised their sentiments placed all blame on Forrest’s shoulders, branding him a “paedo”, “pervert”, “kiddy-fiddler”, and other such endearing epithets. Stammers, by both the mob’s and the press’ reckoning, was an innocent, sexually oblivious “child”, “abducted” from home and hearth by an opportunistic predator.

meganstammers1

Which begs some fucking questions:

If the general populace views fifteen-year-old Stammers as non-answerable for her actions, what’s with their Two Decades Hate against Thompson and Venables for a crime they committed in their fucking primary school years?

Why do UK lawmakers hold ten-year-old murderers criminally responsible, yet view a girl halfway through secondary school as “statutorily raped” if she willingly sucks off a bloke twice her age?

Why is the UK a nation of cognitively-broken schizophrenics who struggle to string together a consistent line of thought?

Once again, I suspect this is a testament to the power of childhood, actual and designated, to erode the cerebral capacity of most of the adult population. According to the clouded thinking of many an adult, childhood – a state determined for them by legislative scribblings – is a time of unique innocence and psychological purity, uncontaminated by the vice, darkness, and depravity of adult life…and woe betide anyone who would show or tell them otherwise! I attest that any anger against Thompson and Venables lingers not only for their crime against the child Jamie Bulger, but also for their unwitting attack on the very concept of childhood the majority hold so close to their hearts (perhaps closer than their actual kids). It’s never nice to have one’s cognitive dissonance, delusion-dependence, and plain irrationality exposed to the harsh glare of reality – which might explain their vehement, denialist reassertion of such traits.

Fortunately, there are some who still carry the ability to think with something approaching clarity. Although I have some issues with Frank Furedi’s analysis of the situation, I appreciate the fact he brings something approaching rigour to back up his position:

For me the most disquieting moment is this shameful episode was when I read the summing up of the case against the two children by the trial judge Mr Justice Morland. The killing of James Bulger was ‘an act of unparalleled evil and barbarity’ concluded the judge. These carefully crafted words not only communicated the idea that the killing committed by these two children was an act of evil but also suggested that it was also ‘unparalleled’ and therefore worse than the terrible deeds perpetrated by adults. The conviction and sentencing of the two children provoked a reaction that a civilised society usually reserves for hardened war criminals. ‘How do you feel now, you little bastards?’ asked the Daily Star while the headline of the Daily Mirror stated ‘Freaks of Nature’.

Strangely the myth of the feral child coexists with the powerful counter-myth of the innocent child who is incapable of lying or wrong-doing. Both of these myths are the product of adult fantasy. Both of them express sentiments that fail to grasp the reality of children’s lives. Parents who are continually confronted with engaging and processing these highly polarised myths often become distracted from seeing children for what they are –just children. And that’s the shameful legacy of moral panic created in response to the tragedy of James Bulger.

I must also express a nodding admiration for (though not full agreement with) the sentiments expressed on a previous post by Inferno commenter Jared:

…this is one issue that really bugs me how so many fuckers want to increase the age at which people can enjoy certain freedoms yet at the same time want to lower the age that people are held accountable for their actions. On that issue, here’s my offer to those law and order types, when you let 14 year olds, fuck, smoke drink, and everything else then I’ll support you guys putting them in the electric chair when they kill someone.

Alas, lushes and reprobates, such lucid thinking is the exception, rather than the rule, in a society caught up in an abject, embarrassing fetishism of childhood and youth. As long as the good people of Slave Britannia cling to their taboos like Bulger’s mum clings to her remaining child, expect this pathetic phenomenon to re-emerge at many a point in the foreseeable future.

~MRDA~

Posted in Moral Panic, Personal, Politics, Psychology, Slave Britannia, Society, The UK | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , | 2 Comments

Incels, Invalids, & Intimacy: A MRDAtarian Perspective

Posted on 20th February 2013 by MRDA

jositos_will_heidi_hot_wheelchair_sex_fetish_porn1

A week ago, my favourite bottle fairy (Cheers, Tink!) drew my attention to an interesting Guardian article dealing with the sex drives of disabled folk. Triggered by recent revelations of care home workers hiring sex surrogates to sate the lusts of those confined to their care, the article compiles a variety of views on the subject, including this soundbite by one Mik Scarlet:

It’s like the world telling you that disabled people are so unsexy that the only way they can have sex is to pay for it. If you’re growing up as a disabled child or someone who’s just come to disability, how does that affect how you feel about yourself? I don’t want a world where it’s easier for disabled people to visit sex workers, I want a world that sees disabled people as sexual and valid prospective partners.

Many would call this a laudable sentiment and I’d be hard pressed to disagree. However, seeing as the general public won’t be aligning with Scarlet’s vision anytime soon, what will the horny handicapped do for release and stimulation in the meantime? If the general public regard the disabled, in aggregate, as undesirable sexual partners, isn’t interfering with their one outlet simply adding to the cruelty and aridity of their situation? Folk with an anti-prostitution bias dismiss the undesired with a sneer of “let them stroke cock”, but even wanking sounds a tad impractical for those who lack the limbs required for the task.

That said, I’m sure plenty of disabled folk out there get more in the way of cock and/or cunt than many an able-bodied person. Even if the sexual dalit caste contains huge swathes of the crippled and invalid, they’re by no means its only members (neither does it encompass them in toto); beyond the world of the wheelchairs, there exist a plethora of people who may as well be bedridden amputees for all the interest they elicit from those they desire. For them, as well as for their disabled cousins, all the pity in the world’s no substitute for the alleviation of their pent-up yearnings.

Fuck, even in Scarlet’s ideal world, there’d still be a shitload of incel incapacitates passed over in the sexual arena; for them and their more ambulate counterparts, Mik’s heaven would still be hell. Nothing illuminates the inequality of existence quite like the push ‘n’ pull of sexual selection; and, no doubt, nothing exacerbates the ire of incels like the pisstaking and pathos tossed their way in place of pussy (and/or penis). For the bodily-impaired, it must be twice as as infuriating, what with having to deal with the nauseating cultural paternalism that follows them around on account of their condition. All too often, people claim them as living, breathing pets, assuming that because two of their legs are inactive, their third must be also.

I say sod that! I’m guessing the invalids and incels of the world could do without the sexual protectionism and stigmatization erected between them and their drives. Sure, paying for it’s (usually) far from ideal – I doubt the majority of working girls address the more emotional strains of TLC romantic partners (and sex surrogates) specialise in – but at least letting down the barriers to it would serve to satisfy the more primal intimacies craved by most members of our species, particularly those members who would otherwise go without.

~MRDA~

Posted in Civil Liberties, Moral Panic, News, Perspectivism, Sex, Society | Tagged , , , , , | 3 Comments

MRDArous Aphorisms: A Compilation

Posted on 8th February 2013 by MRDA

58577_10150250823500367_7291369_n1

  • Sometimes, concision can make a better incision.
  • If “real men don’t buy girls”, does that make the sex trade a collective hallucination?
  • “Innocence” is merely an adult’s romanticised view of childhood ignorance.
  • Intelligence is no guarantee of decreased fallibility; in fact, it might simply mean the ability to fuck things up in a more interesting way.
  • When people try to divide existence between the “natural” and the “unnatural”, that’s when you know the conversation has gone full-retard.
  • Hold love close to your chest and never let it go – asphyxiation will do the rest.
  • Always remember: You’re one trade-off out of seven billion (until the next population surge/grand catastrophe).
  • Who is this “we”, mass-man?
  • “Love sickness”: a tautology, surely?
  • Given all else she’d unleashed upon the world, wasn’t it rather passive-aggressive of Pandora to let out nothing but Hope to counteract it?
  • Feminists: überbitches cosplaying as underdogs.
  • For some topics, the most “enlightened” thing to say may be nothing at all.
  • You say “manarchist” like it’s a “bad” thing.
  • Being an authority figure means never having to say you’re sorry.
  • Nihilsm: the mind’s laxative.
  • The truth shall set you free…from either your delusions, or sanity.
  • Consciously or otherwise, woman is a Social Darwinist made flesh.
  • In an emotion-driven world, the power to capture and crush hearts is the most potent of all.
  • The tendency to agonize over loved ones is often one’s inner White Knight preying on one’s mind for his own survival.
  • “The greatest good for the greatest number”: rationale for a gang rape.
  • Sometimes, knowing it’s all a joke is the very thing that keeps it from being funny.
  • A self-hater’s manifesto: “I’ll tolerate anything except intolerance.”
  • All too often, “Grow up!” is a belligerently cowardly way of saying “Submit!”, “Surrender!”, “Give up!”.
  • Human beings: still the world’s #1 STD.
  • When folk say “honesty is the best policy”, the question that enters my mind is: “Cui bono?”
  • Basic paradox: Folk only like the “selfless” for their own selfish reasons.
  • Never let basic reading comprehension get in the way of your moral indignation.
  • Codification: Definition at the expense of clarity.
  • “Should” ruins everything.
  • Being “the same decaying, organic matter as everyone else” does not preclude being “a beautiful, unique snowflake”.

~MRDA~

Posted in Amoralism, Aphorisms, Egoism, Gender Issues, Moral Panic, MRDArous Aphorisms, Personal, Perspectivism, Philosophy, Psychology, Quotes, Society | Tagged , , , , , , | 3 Comments

Self-Service Checkout? Please Wait for Assistance…

Posted on 6th February 2013 by MRDA

I was rather amused by this piece of union meme-whorage popping up on my social network space last month.

309708_275807952548144_1476620535_n

As well as the achingly desperate Luddite faggotry lying at the heart of this sorry crusade, the other amusing aspect of this campaign is the fact that these “Pro Labor” nimrods think self-service checkouts works well enough to put anyone out of work.

Since around the time UK supermarket chain Asda merged with much-maligned Stateside chain Walmart, these auto-checkouts have been a regular fixture of my shopping stints. Theoretically, these innovations sound like a sterling idea for a shopper of my mindset: reduced queuing; swift, no-fuss service; zero human interaction.

In practice, these technological marvels prove themselves decidedly unfit for purpose, what with the constant malfunctions, erratic item-acknowledgement, and unaccounted exceptions (Good luck checking out a bottle of Echo Falls without a fuss!). The dreaded drones of “UNEXPECTED ITEM IN THE BAGGING AREA!” and “PLEASE WAIT FOR ASSISTANCE!” tend to be regular fixtures of my shopping runs, followed by the supposed self-checkout seizing up until a nearby assistant sees fit to register the confounded contraption in her line of sight.

With such unaddressed, possibly deliberate, design flaws often kicking in on several machines at once, there’ll always need to be a shuffle of shop staff around to set right what oft fucks up. Someone to rescan that machine-stalling “unexpected item”; someone to reset the machine when that fails; someone to fetch a laminated barcode for that bag of loose oranges; someone to scan your face for the sufficient signs of age one needs to make off with a bottle of rouge…

“Job-killing self-checkout machines”?

Don’t make me laugh!

~MRDA~

Posted in Moral Panic, Personal, Technology | Tagged , , , , , , , | 1 Comment

A Woman’s Work? Behind a Gun

Posted on 26th January 2013 by MRDA

(Previously posted at Mere Anti-Statism)

clip_image0017

Two days ago, the Stateside military lifted its ban on females assuming combat roles. According to The Guardian, Pentagon Defence Secretary (and civilian-assassination-endorsing piece-of-shit) Leon Panetta, together with Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General Martin Dempsey, scribbled away the 1994 prohibition in the ostensible interest of equality, no doubt eliciting cheers from feminists and “gender egalitarians” everywhere.

Per se, I have no real problem with the concept of females fighting on the frontlines in a combat force. Sure, most double-Xers lack the inclination to pursue a martial career, and a considerable number of the inclined lack the tenacity expected as a baseline for the male recruits, but I’ve never seen the sense in categorically prohibiting any population from an opportunity on the basis of statistical probability. As long as the criteria required to enlist doesn’t get eased for the sake of bullshit PC notions like “proportional representation”, where’s the fucking harm in giving the best of the underrepresented a *ahem* fighting chance? If women can fight in the jungles of Latin America, why not elsewhere?

(Some more conservative elements argue that the presence of females on the frontline could have a deleterious effect  on the morale and cohesion of their Y-chromosome counterparts, what with blokes rushing to play Galahad whenever a member of the fairer sex meets with existential danger. It’s a fair point, but not one that can’t be mitigated by sensible policies like segregated barracks et al.)

All that said, things take an altogether less inspiring shape in the context of a 21st Century US military. As pleasing and progressive as the embrace of women (and queerfolk) seems, it takes place against a backdrop of imperialistic interests setting their sights on the next juicy Middle Eastern slab. On the same day, one-time presidential candidate (and Panetta-replacement nominee) John Kerry declared he would do “what [he] must” to ensure Iran wouldn’t enjoy the nuclear insurance de rigueur in his own homeland.

Having secured some support for their interventions in Libya, Obombya and co. can’t go wrong in allowing the Officially Oppressed™ the chance to play oppressor overseas. After all, if you want to wheel your next aggressive adventures through the gate, what better Trojan Horse than a fresh flock of female fighters? If “anti-war” Leftists became passively drooling Obamatards upon the election of Dubya the Darker, they’ll morph into full-on troop-worshipping faggots when they see cuntingents (alongside the usual columns of cock) culling Kurdistanis in the name of liberté, equalité, sororité…

clip_image0029

…mendacité.

To the chickenhawk cheers of many a latte Leftist, these newly empowered GI Janes will hone in on whatever target the Empire sees fit to point them toward at any given moment: today, Syria; tomorrow, Iran; and perhaps the days after that, Sudan, the Congo, Nigeria…

As for the reserves, they can always kick back in the relative safety of a drone console, zapping Pakistani villages with a videogamer’s detachment.

As is often said, a woman’s work is never done.

~MRDA~

Posted in America, Gender Issues, News, Politics | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , | 2 Comments

Ore no Nakama—Survive and Advance!

Posted on 24th January 2013 by MRDA

If I see the loved one suffer, I suffer with him, and I know no rest until I have tried everything to comfort and cheer him; if I see him glad, I too become glad over his joy. From this it does not follow that suffering or joy is caused in me by the same thing that brings out this effect in him, as is sufficiently proved by every bodily pain which I do not feel as he does; his tooth pains him, but his pain pains me.

– Max Stirner

I only want to see you fight the darkness you want to live your life by.

– Corey Taylor

Let’s make this is the best year we possibly can. Triumph of the weird!

– Rachel Haywire

As expected, the apocalypse came and went without much in the way of fanfare, ending nothing more than the eschatological ejaculations of the susceptible and superstitious. Everybody waited for Judgement Day, only for the sceptics to say “Told you so”.

Now in the post-apocalyptic haze of 2013, anticipation has been transferred to the realm of resolution, as the scrappy survivors contemplate not endings but rather new beginnings. Surveying the cultural-economic wasteland, they nevertheless make the silent pledge to survive and advance, despite the chaos that exists around them…

vlcsnap-2012-09-27-02h02m46s628

…but to do that, they need to come to grips with that which lies within them.

Over the last few years, I’ve had the pleasure and fortune to meet, converse, and/or get drunk with a variety of intelligent, amusing, and endearing persons; persons who are, in some notable way or other, exceptions from the general rung of humanity. Creative, curious, and considerate, they reinforce the embers of idealism and empathy and desire which still burn in me.

vlcsnap-2013-01-15-13h44m03s1616

Alas, it’s not all revelry and irreverence. Whilst many of the aforementioned folk are well on their way to their desired destinations, a not-insignificant number flounder, mired by depression, ennui, and shaky self-regard. It lead me to ask the question: Why do these awesome people think of themselves as the abject opposite? What’s the reason behind this inverted Dunning-Kruger effect?

One such friend offered a suggestion along the lines of the exceptional slipping into self-castigation as a result of falling short of the high expectations they set for themselves, whilst the average person merely feels satisfaction with not falling short of the level those around them expect and congregate at. It’d explain a lot: if you have no aspirations, you can have no disappointments, after all. The baseline, the default, the status quo proves contentment enough for the many.

306227_10151270978150957_1843099752_n

I’d also take the role of circumstance into account. Perhaps inner negativity gets fed by a lack of avenues to express those potentials dammed up inside; perhaps it’s a case of being surrounded by the callous, obnoxious, and unsympathetic and lacking the resources to alter the situation. Closed doors and open animosity can wear down even the best, given enough time.

before-you-diagnose-yourself-with-depression-or-low-self-esteem-first-make-sure-that-you-are-not12

In any case, whatever the source of the malaise, I’ll say this…

Stop fucking hitting yourselves. Stop fucking hating yourselves.

Maybe you fucked up royally in the past trying to fit some constricting mould; maybe you got dealt a shitty hand by chemistry or circumstance; maybe, once upon a time, you let sterling opportunities pass you by for this, that, or no reason…

…but no matter how far you are from where you wanna be, keep in mind you’re still also a long fucking way from the grave.

And it’d be a shame to get there without leaving a king-sized “I woz ere!” scar on this wretched world.

So how about you dry your eyes, dust yourself off, get back up, and show them your fucking power?

Make your plans and draw your lines. If you trip up along the way, that’s okay; just find your feet and continue to chase down those dreams you hold dear.

vlcsnap-2013-01-15-13h44m05s1817

I can’t promise you success, but I will assure you that staying stationary is a long and dreary means of self-destruction.

In this Year of the Snake, let’s resolve to shed worn-out, self-castigating skins, sink our fangs into the marrow of rejuvenation, and sting the world with our unique strains of venom.

Above all else, let’s end this year in a different, more becoming spot to where we began it.

I know you have it in you: it’s about time you got the memo…

~MRDA~

Posted in Animé, Egoism, Personal, Psychology, Society | Tagged , , , , , , | Leave a comment

A Fucking Good Time

Posted on 12th December 2012 by MRDA

Ostensibly, she’s a horny, hyper-enhanced, insatiable fuckpig, ready to give hummers to all cummers 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 365 days per year, 3 holes per session…

trinity-hannigan-post

…until the director yells “cut”, upon which she reverts to a hollow, empty, used-up shell of a woman, living only for the next shoot, the next snort, the next memory-altering high to blot out the lows of her child fuck-toy past.

200804171312451

Such is the sorry existence of the spread-legged starlet known as the porno “actress”. Just ask any social conservative or Dworkinite diva. If they say it, it must be true. Right?

Oh, wait…

Female porn stars are psychologically as healthy or healthier than other women, according to a new study, which challenges widely held views about women in the adult entertainment business.

Adult entertainers were found to have higher self-esteem, a better quality of life and body image, and to be more positive, with greater levels of spirituality. They also had higher levels of sexual satisfaction and, perhaps unsurprisingly, many more partners than other women.

The American researchers, who report their findings in the Journal of Sex Research, said they found no evidence to support the “damaged goods hypothesis” that actresses involved in the porn industry come from desperate backgrounds and are less psychologically healthy compared with typical women.

[…]

The psychologists compared data taken from 177 adult entertainment actresses with a sample of women matched for age, marital status and other factors. The actresses, all of whom had been paid to work on at least one X-rated movie, ranged in age from 18 to 50, with an average career in the industry of 3.5 years. More than one-third were either married or in a serious relationship, and 44 per cent were single.

One of the main claims by commentators on the industry has been that actresses have frequently experienced sexual abuse in childhood, but the results show no statistically significant difference between the two groups of women.

The study also shows that the actresses sleep better and have more energy. Almost 70 per cent gave enjoyment of sex full marks, compared with 33 per cent of the other women; and they had first had sex at a lower age: 15 rather than 17. On the negative side, industry workers had a history of more drug and alcohol use, and problems possibly linked to sensation-seeking personalities. The study was undertaken by researchers at Shippensburg University, Texas Woman’s University and the Adult Industry Medical Healthcare Foundation.

Cynthia Graham, senior lecturer in health psychology at Southampton University, said: “This study really challenges views about women who engage in sex work and the porn industry. Although the study had limitations, it is one of very few that has included matched controls.”

– Roger Dobson, The Independent

Now, of course, this is but one study of a small segment of porno industry women, and the prevalence of powder-noses is noted, in line with the stereotype. Nevertheless, if this sample is indeed representative of the wider world of Planet Porn, it presents something of a challenge to conservo and feminist narratives that preach pain and degradation.

u-mad-ho2

Frankly, I think you’d have to be an exceptionally bitter, internally contorted human being to not want the study findings to be characteristic of the wider industry. Why wouldn’t feminists, gynocentrists, and wimmins rights groups want porn, prostitution, stripping, and other aspects of the skin trade to be dominated by happy, fulfilled, intelligent sisters in control of their own sexualities?

Actually, I can think of an overriding reason—their urge to dominate the discourse.

600240_4977738485141_278095612_n1

Like many who lust for control, the aforementioned special interests need a blubbering mess of broken, bruised, abused victims for validation. Hence you get femiternalists taking worst case scenarios, like sex trafficking and child prostitution, and framing them as the throbbing heart of the gash-for-cash trade.

trafficking-med2

The universalization (and valorisation) of the victim serves as the perfect Trojan Horse to wheel in gynoconservative measures against both men and women who don’t stick to the script; thus follow the shutdowns of strip clubs, proposals for mandatory filth filters (“for the sake of the children”, of course), anti-Page 3 petitions, and the attempts to stigmatise and criminalise shaking out a hand shandy to neotenous sex starlets.

amailiu-61

In effect at least, such neo-Puritan measures amount to a sanctified, and often legislated, cockblock.

Which brings me onto another wonderful end result all these assorted interests seem to be aiming for.  Whilst the more straightforwardly conservative elements want to protect the purity ‘n’ piety of the pussy, the femorrhoids want to eliminate all threats not just to their worldview, but to their visibility and desirability. Propagating “exploitation” narratives, and dismissing the experience of many a woman to the contrary by branding them “gender traitors” or “damaged goods”, these hectors and harridans seek to posit themselves as the epitomes of health and attractiveness.

Either that, or they’re just killjoys for the sake of it, deriving a certain satisfaction from enforcing an equality of misery. I think H. L. Mencken put it best when he pegged Puritanism as “the haunting fear that someone, somewhere, may be happy”.

As well as sexual protectionism, there’s also a sizeable dollop of what I call sexual exceptionalism (or sexceptionalism) in anti-sex industry rhetoric; by that I mean the notion that when it comes to employment, economics, and/or ejaculation, being a sex worker of any kind constitutes a special and unique type of “exploitation” that warrants  extra-special attention. As well as the expected family values and feminist variants, I’ve  encountered commies bitching about some “lumpenproletariat slut” or other slurping scrotes for notes. In their eyes, Sharon selling her slit is “an insult to the working class who actually have to go out there and struggle for nothing”: a middle finger raised with each cock.

In my eyes, such commie conniptions amount to an economic form of Puritanism: clear and present ressentiment against someone who makes more in a day with her starfish than they do in a week with Starbucks. As a former retail runt, I have some sympathy for those pissed-off about having little control over their time and income, if not the desire to exalt that state to a sacred virtue.

By contrast, disrobing for dinero doesn’t sound like such an awful gig. If you’re in the porn industry, you can get rich and famous doing something you love; if you’re a prozzy, you can set your own hours and rates (if you’re smart enough to forego a pimp); and if you’re a stripper, “look but don’t touch” must surely be a more inspiring ethos to work under than “the customer is always right”. Were I in possession of two comely x-chromosomes, I wouldn’t turn my nose up at any of that (though my arse might be a different story).

Gendercrats, so-cons, and class warriors can spit all they want, but I can’t see happy, self-fulfilled harlots willing to swallow…

drink-cum-glass1

…except on camera, for a pre-negotiated fee…

EDIT (1/2/13): It seems that this entry caught the attention of the LGBT libertarian show Flaming Freedom. Check out the podcast: tis quite amusing and refreshing to hear my scribings read out “on air”, as it were…

~MRDA~

Posted in Entertainment, Gender Issues, Moral Panic, Retinal Reprobation | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | 13 Comments

These Dreams # 2: Love is Destruction

Posted on 23rd November 2012 by MRDA

watchmennukekiss

Another day, another dream, and this one seems like a continuation of a rather striking one I had a year ago, not just in terms of cast but also theme.

Annoyingly , I can’t remember the precise details of what went on for the most of it; all I can remember consists of various rapport-building hijinks between me and this woman I know. (Vaguely, stuff involving social networks, and traipsing round retail areas causing chaos with a supporting cast of friends: chimerical memories lost in the fucking ether.)

However, I remember the end of it all pretty damn vividly.

We have an argument for some lost reason, during which she “confesses” affection for me.

“Can’t you see I like you, you stupid, stupid boy?”

To which I reply with a smile: “I guess I don’t deserve you.”

She then proceeds to go thermonuclear upon my saying this, making it pretty fucking clear I’m no longer welcome in her presence—don’t let the door hit your arse on the way out, MRDA! I pretty much figure that trying to pierce through her layers of rage would be a waste of time and take my leave.

After a certain amount of time (days?) had passed, during which I mulled over all the fun times we had, I decide to go over and resolve the situation. When I get round to hers, I notice she’s completely trashed her room over this—I figure she must really like me.

However, in a move which I’m unsure whether to classify as ‘scumbag brain’ or ‘welcome killswitch’, an overriding voice, my voice, cries out something akin to “YOU’RE WRONG—SHE LIKES HIM!”, seguing me slowly to consciousness with that act of will. Part of me felt relief; another part felt exasperation for not “sticking around” to conclude matters.

Amongst all the fuzzy and muddled thoughts that accompany waking from an intense dream, I felt something not entirely unlike deja vu, and not without reason: as I mentioned earlier, this hadn’t been the first chimerical episode featuring this femme. A year ago, we ran around in a dreamspace version of Stratford, a hotspot of the recent Olympic games and an area I loathe with a passion…except that I had so much fun with her, I didn’t give a fuck it took place in that shithole. We ran around laughing, joking, eating ice cream and generally getting high off each other’s presence…

…and later in the dream, the world came to its infernal end.

One woman. Two blow-ups: one metaphorical; one literal.

I wonder what message, if any, lies within this Neptunian Never Never Land…

~MRDA~

Posted in Dreams, Personal, Psychology | Tagged , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Walter Kaufmann on “Equality of Opportunity”

Posted on 8th November 2012 by MRDA

kaufmann

Right now, I’m having an enjoyable time reading through my years-long-neglected hardcover copy of Without Guilt and Justice: From Decidophobia to Autonomy, a relatively obscure work by prominent Fritz-translator Walter Kaufmann. I’m thinking about dedicating a post or two to this work, which could be read as Kaufmann’s culmination of the Nietzschean project, but for now, I’m just gonna share a few illuminating passages on “equal opportunities” with you:

“When the appeal to equality fails, it is customary to fall back on equality of opportunity. But equality of opportunity is unobtainable. People are born with radically unequal opportunities. Their health, constitution, talents, and capacities are widely different.

We could come closer to equality of opportunity by outlawing random breeding. Allowing only the most favored specimens to beget children would, paradoxically, give them a vital opportunity denied to the vast majority. One could permit sexual intercourse as now, while restricting impregnation to artificial insemination, and people would not have to be told who were the fathers of the children born under this system. Even then some women would have the opportunity – or perhaps the duty – to give birth again and again, while most women would be denied this opportunity or excused from this obligation. In such a society millions could have a single father. But brothers and sisters, and even more so half-brothers and half-sisters, often differ widely in health, constitutions, talents, and capacities. Only cloning could really produce equality of opportunity at birth – if one made all people almost literally equal; but presumably, one would prefer at least two models: one female, one male.

If all these schemes strike you as so many nightmares, you do not really favor equality of opportunity. Such schemes would involve an incalculable loss in genes; a vast fund of potential talents and capacities would be lost to mankind forever. And family life as we know it would cease.”

“Environment during the preschool years remains decisive for one’s character, intelligence, and whole development. This is not only a Freudian tenet, but recent work by child psychologists confirms conclusively how much intelligence depends on the mother’s attitude toward the infant, on her encouragement or detachment. Children from utterly different backgrounds plainly do not have equality of opportunity.

The notion that integrated schools provide equality of opportunity for all is untenable as long as children live in widely different homes. And it is downright ridiculous as long as teachers do little real teaching, assign a great deal of homework, and expect the parents to help with the homework and explain what is not clear.”

“Equality of opportunity also involves some reduction in opportunities. Wherever equality is held to be crucial, some leveling is inevitable. It is told that Alexander the Great was offered a drink of water on a hot day when he and his army had gone without any water for a long time, and that, seeing that there was not enough water for all, he refused the offer and spilled the water into the sand. If every opportunity that cannot be offered to all is refused and goes to waste, few opportunities can be accepted.

People neither desire nor are able to make use of the same opportunities. To deny a man opportunities that he desires and could put to use simply because many others do not wish for the same opportunities would be pernicious.

In any case, what is equality of opportunity? At what stage in their lives are people supposed to have it? If they are to have it always, we must rigidly control their lives from birth to death, in order to make sure that they do not make choices that will deprive them of various opportunities. Granted freedom, people make different choices, learn different things, acquire different skills and habits, run different risks and sometimes pay the price, tie themselves down in various ways, and before long have very different opportunities. There is thus a tension between freedom and equality of opportunity, and we should not do everything we can to bring about the latter.

Those who claim to be for equality of opportunity do not advocate measures that would really promote less inequality of opportunity at birth than we now have. They are not mainly concerned about the time of birth. If equality of opportunity is wanted, but neither at birth, or not only at birth, nor always, some time when people are supposed to have it must be specified. This might be the age when children first attend school, say, at five. If so, it would be indispensable to provide the same controlled environment for all youngsters, giving a centralized authority the power and the means to bring up all children communally in just the same way. Extreme egalitarians might even wish to stifle all expressions of originality and individuality.”

“Equality of opportunity is a slogan, and those who employ it are not really in favor of the means required to bring it about. Men are not equal. Men should not be made equal. And equality of opportunity is either a hollow cliché or a pernicious goal.

(In the Far East the phrase is associated with the open-door policy in China and considered odious. The French phrase la carriere ouverte aux talents is unobjectionable – and does not invoke the myth of equality.)

My claim that men are not equal and that equality is a myth does not entail any bigotry. On the contrary, bigots assume that all Jews are equal – or all Negroes, Germans, or women. My point is that no two men or women are alike. Some statistical generalizations about these groups are well founded, but they do not indicate that all members of the group are alike, and I am far from suggesting that distributions, any more than punishments, should be guided by such generalizations. All men and women are brothers and sisters, and each should be considered as an individual. Giving the same to all is not particularly reasonable, seeing that they are not alike, do not have the same desires, and cannot all use the same things or opportunities.”

Seeing as “equality of opportunity” is a slogan I’ve favoured in the past (contra equality of results), Kaufmann’s words serve as something of a corrective. As I see it now, in civil matters, “levelling the playing field” pales in importance to securing the maximal conditions of personal freedom for any and all to make what they will of themselves (keeping biological and social-existential constraints in mind).

~MRDA~

Posted in Philosophy, Politics, Quotes, Racial Issues | Tagged , , , , , , , | 7 Comments